Authors:
Douglass E. Post;Oscar Goldfarb;
Pages: 4 - 5Abstract: Silicon Valley is the home of many of the most innovative high-technology industries that have ever existed. Their level of innovation gives them a competitive economic advantage that sustains a significant portion of the US economy. While there have been dozens of attempts in the US and abroad to replicate this success, few have been very successful. A relatively new approach to product development is emerging, computational engineering. It is based on the use of computing, especially high-performance computing, to design, construct, and analyze virtual prototypes of new products.PubDate:
November/December 2017
Issue No:Vol. 19, No. 6 (2017)

Authors:
Douglass Post;Scott Sundt;
Pages: 6 - 8Abstract: With an annual budget of nearly US600 billion, the US Department of Defense (DoD) is tasked with protecting the US and its allies and interests abroad against potential adversaries. It must accomplish these tasks in a globalized and highly interconnected world where the pace of technology is moving faster than the current time-consuming DoD acquisition systems can keep up with. Moving forward, the DoD must change these time-consuming paradigms and accelerate the pace of innovation. One way to do this is to shift to a virtual prototyping environment where the benefits of high-performance supercomputing and complex physics-based engineering software can expand the decision space and enable the DoD to field better systems faster, cheaper, and at less risk than previous methods. This is the goal of the Computational Research and Engineering Acquisition Tools and Environments (CREATE) program. This issue of CiSE provides the third installment of articles relating to the history, formation, and ongoing work of the High Performance Computing Modernization Program (HPCMP) CREATE program.PubDate:
November/December 2017
Issue No:Vol. 19, No. 6 (2017)

Authors:
Loren Miller;
Pages: 9 - 17Abstract: Changing from physical prototype–based product design to computational (virtual) prototype–based product design requires more than leading edge computational engineering codes, joint R&D efforts with a Department of Energy Laboratory, brilliant and dedicated researchers, and meticulous verification, validation, and uncertainty quantification. For the most difficult engineering design problems, most of these are necessary but not sufficient. In every case, the designers, engineers, scientists, and their management must also believe that the benefits in time savings and more creative new products justify the cost and risk of conversion. In the extreme case, an impending crisis may force conversion even in the face of strong resistance. The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company’s experience illustrates a successful, crisis-driven transition to virtual prototype–based product design.PubDate:
November/December 2017
Issue No:Vol. 19, No. 6 (2017)

Authors:
Richard P. Kendall;Lawrence G. Votta;Douglass E. Post;E. Thomas Moyer;Scott A. Morton;
Pages: 18 - 26Abstract: The goal of the CREATE program is to develop and deploy physics-based computational engineering tools that can be used to develop virtual prototypes of ships, air vehicles, ground vehicles, and radio frequency antennas to accurately predict their performance in support of the US Department of Defense acquisition process, DoD 5000. The purpose of this article is to describe the approach taken to address the verification and validation of the CREATE software products. The approach is based on the adoption of a set of practices aligned with the recommendations of the National Academy of Sciences to promote a test-driven development culture.PubDate:
November/December 2017
Issue No:Vol. 19, No. 6 (2017)

Authors:
Sung-Eun Kim;Hua Shan;Ronald Miller;Bong Rhee;Abel Vargas;Shawn Aram;Joseph Gorski;
Pages: 33 - 39Abstract: The main challenge facing simulation-based hydrodynamic design of naval ships comes from the complexity of the salient physics involved around ships, which is further compounded by the multidisciplinary nature of ship applications. Simulation of the flow physics using “first principles” is computationally very expensive and time-consuming. Other challenges largely pertain to software engineering, ranging from software architecture, verification and validation (V & V), and quality assurance. This article presents a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) framework called NavyFOAM that has been built around OpenFOAM, an open source CFD library written in C that heavily draws upon object-oriented programming. In the article, the design philosophy, features, and capabilities of the software framework, and computational approaches underlying NavyFOAM are described, followed by a description of the V&V effort and application examples selected from Navy’s recent R&D and acquisition programs.PubDate:
November/December 2017
Issue No:Vol. 19, No. 6 (2017)

Authors:
Jack S. Hale;Lizao Li;Christopher N. Richardson;Garth N. Wells;
Pages: 40 - 50Abstract: Containers are an emerging technology that holds promise for improving productivity and code portability in scientific computing. The authors examine Linux container technology for the distribution of a nontrivial scientific computing software stack and its execution on a spectrum of platforms from laptop computers through high-performance computing systems. For Python code run on large parallel computers, the runtime is reduced inside a container due to faster library imports. The software distribution approach and data that the authors present will help developers and users decide on whether container technology is appropriate for them. The article also provides guidance for vendors of HPC systems that rely on proprietary libraries for performance on what they can do to make containers work seamlessly and without performance penalty.PubDate:
November/December 2017
Issue No:Vol. 19, No. 6 (2017)

Authors:
Micah D. Schuster;Nargess Memarsadeghi;
Pages: 54 - 63Abstract: The need for faster, more efficient algorithms is an important aspect of scientific computing. Generally, scientists are only exposed to computational issues that arise in their field. Thus, collaboration between a numerical analyst and a scientist is becoming necessary for scientific computing. The purpose of this case study is to expose computer scientists to processes that an astronomer would use to obtain useful results from raw data.PubDate:
November/December 2017
Issue No:Vol. 19, No. 6 (2017)

Authors:
Giora Alexandron;Michal Armoni;Michal Gordon;David Harel;
Pages: 64 - 71Abstract: This is the second part of a two-part series that describes a pilot programming course in which high school students majoring in computer science were introduced to the visual, scenario-based programming language of live sequence charts. The main rationale for the course was that computer science students should be exposed to at least two very different programming paradigms and that LSCs, with their unique characteristics, can be a good vehicle for that. Part 1 (see the previous issue) focused on the pedagogic rationale of the pilot, on introducing LSC, and on the structure of the course. Part 2 centers on the evaluation of the pilot’s results.PubDate:
November/December 2017
Issue No:Vol. 19, No. 6 (2017)

Authors:
Michael Michalski;Martin Rieth;Andreas Kempf;Jens Krüger;
Pages: 72 - 78Abstract: One of the problems with which researchers of different domains, such as chemistry and fluid dynamics, are concerned is the optimization of coal combustion processes to increase the efficiency, safety, and cleanliness of such systems. The coal combustion process is reproduced by using complex simulations that normally produce highly complex data comprising many characteristics. Such datasets are employed by scientists to validate their hypotheses or to present new hypotheses, and the data analysis is mostly restricted to time-consuming workflows only capable of a portion of the data’s full spectrum. To support the experts, interactive visualization and analysis tools have been developed by different suppliers to manage and understand multivariate data.PubDate:
November/December 2017
Issue No:Vol. 19, No. 6 (2017)

Authors:
Mary Ann Leung;
Pages: 79 - 81Abstract: CiSE announces the creation of a new diversity and inclusion department and the inaugural editor, Mary Ann Leung from Sustainable Horizons Institute. A brief review of the status of diversity in computing and science and engineering is presented as well as a call to the community to engage in the discussion and contribute articles and/or letters to the new department.PubDate:
November/December 2017
Issue No:Vol. 19, No. 6 (2017)

Authors:
Jonathan Hines;
Pages: 82 - 84Abstract: As part of a project dedicated to modeling how single-celled purple bacteria turn light into food, a team of computational scientists from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign simulated a complete ATP synthase, the power plant of the cell, in all-atom detail. The work builds on the project’s first phase—a 100-million atom photosynthetic organelle called a chromatophore—and gives scientists an unprecedented glimpse into a biological machine whose energy efficiency far surpasses that of any artificial system.PubDate:
November/December 2017
Issue No:Vol. 19, No. 6 (2017)

Authors:
Lorena A. Barba;George K. Thiruvathukal;
Pages: 85 - 87Abstract: The editors of the new track for reproducible research outline the parameters for future peer review, submission, and access, highlighting the magazine’s previous work in this field and some of the challenges still to come.PubDate:
November/December 2017
Issue No:Vol. 19, No. 6 (2017)